Steven Guilbeault

A gathering of countries in Rome this week agreed on a plan to generate $200 billion US in finance a year by 2030 to halt and begin to reverse the destruction of the natural world. The United Nations’ COP16 talks on biodiversity began last October in Colombia but failed to reach an agreement on who would contribute, how the money would be gathered and who would oversee it. …Led by negotiators from the so-called BRICS countries — Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. …The finance deal is a result of a landmark agreement in Montreal in 2022, when countries agreed to protect 30 per cent of the world’s lands and oceans. Canadian negotiators, led by federal Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault, got that deal through complex and fraught negotiations involving 196 countries. Since then, the Canadian government has pushed funding into conservation efforts, including $200 million for Inuit-led conservation in the Arctic.